There are many more ways than one to skin this cat – it’s going to be while before they all shake out.
One solution being deployed to increase range and convenience in electric vehicles is from the company Better Place, and currently up-and-running in Israel, Denmark, and soon, Australia.
You don’t have to recharge a car’s battery, because you don’t own the battery – the battery is swappable, and replaced when it’s discharged.
Below, battery swap station in operation in Israel.
Here are a bunch of Better Place videos, including “Wall Street Backs Better Place”.
http://bit.ly/uJ3NpR
Odd music choice in that video.
The problem with battery swapping is that you either need every EV to use the same batteries, or you need to have every type of battery available at every swapping station (and the ability to swap every type of battery, and every EV to be built for swapping).
It’s never struck me as a very practical solution.
It does come across as an enormous cart (standardization) before the horse (commercialization) problem. If they achieve scale, it’s at least plausible.
To me it seems like one of those “better future” communist propaganda.. 🙂
Alex
A better and longer presentation can be seen here:
http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/11323
neilrieck, Great interview, including a pithy quote (with 1 word edit) – “We have all the energy we want to make electrons [flow]. But no energy to make our cars go.”